Photo Glossary - 05 - White Balance

White balance is a setting on most digital cameras that allows the photographer to compensate for colour casts caused by different lighting conditions. All light has a dominant colour. That is not to say that it contains only that colour (such as the light from a red traffic light) but rather that it contains more of that colour than other colours. In general natural light is cool and results in photos with a blue tint, while artificial light is warm and results in photos with a yellow tint. These tints are most noticeable on white objects.

In automatic mode white balance is controlled by the camera.